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Sunday, April 12, 2015

The Defining Moment, and Hillary Rodham Clinton

At a time when average
working people need a president who will fight for them, the question
is whether Hillary Clinton is willing to be bold and to fight. This is a
defining moment for Democrats, America and Clinton, herself.

If there were ever a time for a bold Democratic voice on behalf of hardworking Americans, it is now.

Yet I don’t recall a time when the Democratic Party’s most prominent
office holders sounded as meek. With the exception of Elizabeth Warren,
they’re pussycats. If Paul Wellstone, Teddy Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, or
Ann Richards were still with us, they’d be hollering.

The fire now is on the right, stoked by the Koch brothers, Rupert Murdoch, and a pocketful of hedge-fund billionaires.

Today’s Republican firebrands, beginning with Ted Cruz, blame the
poor, blacks, Latinos, and immigrants for what’s been happening. They
avoid any mention of wealth and power.

Which brings me to Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Some wonder about the strength of her values and ideals. I don’t.
I’ve known her since she was 19 years old, and have no doubt where her
heart is. For her entire career she’s been deeply committed to equal
opportunity and upward mobility.

Some worry she’s been too compromised by big money – that the circle
of wealthy donors she and her husband have cultivated over the years has
dulled her sensitivity to the struggling middle class and poor.

But it’s wrong to assume great wealth, or even a social circle of the
wealthy, is incompatible with a deep commitment to reform – as Teddy
Roosevelt and his fifth-cousin Franklin clearly demonstrated.

The more relevant concern is Hillary Clinton’s willingness to fight.

Politicians usually seek to appeal to as many voters as possible,
eschewing controversy. After a devastating first midterm election, her
husband famously “triangulated” between Democrats and Republicans, seeking to find a middle position above the fray.

But these times are different. Not in ninety years has America
harbored a greater concentration of wealth at the very top. Not since
the Gilded Age of the 1890s has American politics been as corrupted by
big money as it is today.

If Hillary Clinton is to get the mandate she needs for America to get
back on track, she will have to be clear with the American people about
what is happening and why – and what must be done.

For example: Wall Street is still running the economy, and still out of control.

So we must resurrect the Glass-Steagall Act
and bust up the biggest banks, so millions of Americans don’t ever
again lose their homes, jobs, and savings because of Wall Street’s
excesses.

Also: Increase taxes on the rich in order to finance the investments in schools and infrastructure the nation desperately needs.

Strengthen unions so working Americans have the bargaining power to get a fair share of the gains from economic growth.

Limit the deductibility of executive pay, and raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour.

Oppose trade agreements like the Trans Pacific Partnership designed to protect corporate property but not American jobs.

And nominate Supreme Court justices who will reverse “Citizens United.”

She should use such policies to illustrate the problem, and make a vivid moral case for why such policies are necessary.

In recent decades Republicans have made a moral case for less
government and lower taxes on the rich, based on their idea of
“freedom.”

They talk endlessly about freedom but they never talk about power.
But it’s power that’s askew in America –concentrated power that’s
constraining the freedom of the vast majority.

Hillary Clinton should make the moral case about power: for taking it
out of the hands of those with great wealth and putting it back into
the hands of average working people.

In these times, such a voice and message make sense politically. The
2016 election will be decided by turnout, and turnout will depend on
enthusiasm. The largest party in America isn’t the Republican or
Democratic Parties; it is the Party of Non-Voters, who have become so
cynical about politics they’ve ceased voting.

If she talks about what’s really going on and what must be done about
it, she can arouse the Democratic base as well as millions of
Independents and even Republicans who have concluded, with reason, that
the game is rigged against them.

The question is not her values and ideals. It’s her willingness to be
bold and to fight, at a time when average working people need a
president who will fight for them more than they’ve needed such a
president in living memory.

This is a defining moment for Democrats, and for America. It is also a defining moment for Hillary Clinton.

Bio:
ROBERT B. REICH, one of the nation’s leading experts on work and the
economy, is Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at the Goldman
School of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley. He
has served in three national administrations, most recently as secretary
of labor under President Bill Clinton. Time Magazine has named him one
of the ten most effective cabinet secretaries of the last century. He
has written thirteen books, including his latest best-seller,
“Aftershock: The Next Economy and America’s Future;” “The Work of
Nations,” which has been translated into 22 languages; and his newest,
an e-book, “Beyond Outrage.” His syndicated columns, television
appearances, and public radio commentaries reach millions of people each
week. He is also a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine,
and Chairman of the citizen’s group Common Cause. His widely-read blog
can be found at www.robertreich.org. Robert Reich's new film,
"Inequality for All" is available on DVD and blu-ray, and on Netflix.

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